Stupid media tricks: Al Kamen division

In his final section of this morning’s In The Loop column, WaPo’s Al Kamen decided to have some fun with words he lifted from yesterday’s presidential news conference:

Send In the IRS

Bushism of the midweek. From yesterday's news conference: "We dealt with a recession, a terrorist attack and corporate scandals. And we did it by cutting taxes."

One more cut in capital gains, and Osama's toast.

Now that’s clever breakfast reading. I nearly choked on my bagel I was chortling so.

Of course, it loses some of its witty edge when served up with even a shmeer of context – let’s try some:

The president was actually responding to a question about Alan Greenspan’s book criticizing him “for being fiscally irresponsible.” [emphasis added]

“I respectfully disagree with Alan Greenspan when it comes to saying that this administration didn't handle the fiscal — fiscal issues we faced in a good fashion. As a matter of fact, we did.

The deficit, as a percent of GDP, is low; it's lower than the 30-year average. We have submitted a plan to balance the budget. We dealt with a recession, a terrorist attack and corporate scandals. And we did it by cutting taxes. The tax cuts worked. The economy recovered. People are working. Interest rates are low.”

So the President never really suggested we dealt with 9/11 or corporate scandals by cutting taxes.

In his final section of this morning’s In The Loop column, WaPo’s Al Kamen decided to have some fun with words he lifted from yesterday’s presidential news conference:

Send In the IRS

Bushism of the midweek. From yesterday's news conference: "We dealt with a recession, a terrorist attack and corporate scandals. And we did it by cutting taxes."

One more cut in capital gains, and Osama's toast.

Now that’s clever breakfast reading. I nearly choked on my bagel I was chortling so.

Of course, it loses some of its witty edge when served up with even a shmeer of context – let’s try some:

The president was actually responding to a question about Alan Greenspan’s book criticizing him “for being fiscally irresponsible.” [emphasis added]

“I respectfully disagree with Alan Greenspan when it comes to saying that this administration didn't handle the fiscal — fiscal issues we faced in a good fashion. As a matter of fact, we did.

The deficit, as a percent of GDP, is low; it's lower than the 30-year average. We have submitted a plan to balance the budget. We dealt with a recession, a terrorist attack and corporate scandals. And we did it by cutting taxes. The tax cuts worked. The economy recovered. People are working. Interest rates are low.”

So the President never really suggested we dealt with 9/11 or corporate scandals by cutting taxes.